School plans, coconuts, and a man on a horse

     I either have a great idea or a lovely bunch of coconuts (doodly-doo).  While I do love that song, I’m quite allergic to coconuts.  They make my mouth itch.  Which means that what I have is a potentially great idea.  But, this great idea has a bit of back planning.  So sit down while I tell you a short story.  What?  You’re already sitting?  Stand up.  Now sit down.  Now look at your man.  Now look back at me.  Huh?  Here goes. 

      So, we have a sweet new plan for school.  Right now, we’re doing a work-at-your-own-pace system for school called Educatodos.  It’s a US-Aid funded program to help Honduran Children get accredited through grade school.  It’s a very simple system, so we also teach lots of other classes at school as well.  I teach English, Math, Geography, History, and an assortment of other classes as well.  Anyhow, there are a few problems with this method.  1) I don’t speak a ton of Spanish and my school is in Honduras.  Whenever we get new girls, there is a huge language barrier.  2) Most of our materials (books) are donated from the states.  They are in English.  This makes it hard for me to teach the Spanish-only speakers and nearly impossible for them to learn.  These are the problems that we face at school every day. 

     And so here is the solution.  Mrs. Pam has a missionary friend who runs the largest bilingual school in Honduras.  After discussing some options with her, we’ve decided to try and open our school as a sort of satellite campus of this large and successful school.  We would use an internationally successful program called PACE that would come in English and Spanish.  From my understanding, it is a work-at-your-own-pace program (hence the name, PACE), but incorporates teacher interaction and is much more geared towards preparing children for the university.  We’re still nailing down the plans, but we’re hoping to start this school at our ministry (PTC) as early as January.  This would be a great way to provide a better education for our girls as well as reach out to the community with Christ-focused Education.

     Now here is where you come in.  Ready?  The schooling would cost money.  Each one of the PACE books cost in the ballpark of $2.50.  The children use a number of these books for different courses throughout the year.  Other general school materials (pencils, paper, ect) and fees for educators and uniforms add in to bring the grand total of tuition to about $300 a child per year.  $300!!!  I feel like that is a bargain price to help give a child living in a ministry across the world a hope and a future.  Don’t you?  

     So what I’m looking for are sponsors.  Sponsors to help my girls get an education.  $300 a year is not a lot of money.  I don’t have a great job in the states, but I clear $300 in a week.  In one week I could pay for a girl to have a great education for an entire year.  Most of you who are reading this make MUCH more money than I do (when I’m working a job that actually pays money that is).  You could probably send a girl to school for a year with just one of two days of work.  Or, maybe you’d like to help but really can’t afford this.  Why not share this with your Sunday School class or church group and sponsor one of my girls as a group.  $300 divided by 12 months comes up to $25 a month.  If that is spread out amongst a group of people, the cost comes up to……… pocket change.  

     So think this over.  Share it with other people.  Help me spread the word.  Most of you who are reading this blog know my girls down here.  Or, at least you’re familiar with my ministry.  Help my girls out.  I was blown away by how quickly everybody volunteered to buy shoes for my girls a few months ago.  So that’s why I’m posing this idea to you.  Now, we’re not starting this until January hopefully, but if you or your group would like to sponsor a girl, let me know.  Or, pretty soon I’m going to type up a more formal letter with information that I could send to Sunday School classes, care groups, or churches in general.  If you can think of anybody who might like to help, let me know so I can give them the info. 

You can reach me by e-mail at BHeath09@gmail.com or by message on facebook.

     This was pretty long, but I really appreciate you reading it.  Your time and efforts encourage me more than I can explain.  Thank you.

Home sweet Hogre

I'm back in Honduras.  The weather is wonderful.  I spent about 6 weeks in the states working for my brother.  I'm extremely thankful for the job, but goodness gracious its hot in Georgia.  But I have alittle more money in my pockets and little more muscle in my arms. 

So first thing, I got to spend the first 2 weeks of this trip with 2 teams from my home church.  We had such a large group last year that my church split two groups to send them to the farm this year.  It was really cool to start of my trip in Honduras with my church family there.  My parents even made it down during the second week.  I was pretty super busy, so i didn't get to spend quite as much time with my teams as I had hoped.  Yet it was great staying with them in the mission house and watching them with my girls. 

We have a few MAJOR changes going on at the school.  Last week we hired two Honduran teachers (with college degrees) to take over alot of the teaching responsibilites.  Its both exciting and intimidating at the same time.  I have real high hopes for where the school is going.  The new teachers will be able to cover alot of topics I'm not capable of.  The will also help to take some of the responsibilities at the school off my shoulders.  Yet, I'm not so sure the teachers like listening to a young, North American all of the time.  Now, I by no means know everything about school in Honduras and I obviously need some help up at the school with so many girls.  Yet, in the meetings so far, they seem very.... confident.  I think confidence is a good thing, but sometimes too much confidence can be a bit annoying.  Or if your confidence deters you from taking the director of the school too serious, it leans towards problematic.  They keep telling me about how they have been trained and how school runs in Honduras.  They don't understand yet that want better than that.  But we'll get there when we get there.  Be in prayer for the school please.  We've got some hard weeks of work ahead of us.  But I really feel like we'll be better able to serve the girls in the end.

I'm going to make this a short blog because even though its my day off, I have several more things to do in La Esperanza, need to pick up my bike, and I need to get back to the farm for a meeting.  A couple more things to pray for though please.  1) there have been talks about getting satellite internet at the farm.  This would be awesome.  I could talk to my family for free AND the girls could skype sunday school classes or supporters from the states.  This would be nice.  And 2) sometime in the near future I need to start thinking about fincancial support for the future.  I've been in Honduras for a year and I really feel that God is calling me back for long term (think years, not months).  So far I've been working in the states for months at a time to pay my way.  Yet, I think in order to be down here as much as God has planned for me (and as much as I simply want to be), I will need to look at some other options.  Pray for me though if you think about it.  Sorry I have to pictures and not many fun stories.  I'll try to do something interesting before I write my next blog.  Thanks for reading and please pray for my girls, the staff and myself.

Boom!

Me, Mariela, and a ron-ron on my right shoulder

Boom!  Sometimes I say "Boom!" when something awesome happens.  I just said it.  So if A=B and B=C.....you guessed it....awesomeness has occured.  It took about 3 days for people to volunteer to get all of my girls at the farm birthday sneakers this year.  In fact, I've had several people contact me wanting to get shoes, and I've had to tell them we can't.  We're out of feet!  Boom!  Thats awesome.  I'll keep everybody posted, because theres always a chance that more little girls will call PTC their home in the next year, and I might need some birthday-buying volunteers.  But for now, we're all covered.  About 200 happy toes will have warm places to do whatever happy toes do at The Farm.  Thank you for volunteering and for your support of my girls. 

Anita and Rosy dropping me off at the airport

I've also had several people contact me wanting to know about donating gently used shoes.  All systems go here.  Folks out in our neck of the woods in Honduras walk alot.  Even if we don't use some shoes at the farm with our girls, PTC has the opportunity to minster to the community whenever we have supplies.  So, if you've got shoes, send them in.  Like I said, we've got alot of extra luggage, and I'll make sure they go to a good cause and further the name of Christ.

No caption required

I also just got the last of my pictures from the first half of this year up.  It took a really long time.  I work 60 hour weeks while I'm home, and so I've had to do my picture uploading in spurts around work and sleeping.  But I'm finally done.  Go check them out if you haven't.  You'll see some really pretty faces.  Well, not only mine, but alot of the girls down at The Farm as well.  Looking at the pictures, I realized that my beard ruined alot of pictures that would otherwise have been wonderful.  Maybe in the future, I'll take advice from the girls when they tell me 80 times a day, "Mr. Ben, cut your beard!"

If The Shoe Fits..... send it to my girls as a birthday present

How toe socks and crocs should be worn

     So lets have another go at this “blog” ordeal.  I’ve taken a bit of a vacation from bloggery.  My time in Honduras this year has been so extremely jam packed, I haven’t had time to write anything down.  This year I have facilitated in the birth of three different species of animals, fought forest/mountain fires for several days on end with our neighboring Hondurans, killed and helped clean and cook an Easter hog, citizen-arrested an off-duty police officer, bought a motorcycle, wrecked a motorcycle, y apprende mucho espanol.  Its been eventful, but I was too busy doing to record most of it.  I didn’t really think too many people outside of my family and close friends were following this, so I didn’t worry too much about keeping it going.  One of the teams that visited told me that they knew me from my blog.  I’m going to give it another go during the next few months (or longer).  I know many of you are very connected with our ministry, our missions, and especially our girls.  I hope this keeps the door way open for GREATLY needed prayers and encouragement.

Lucy jumping out of her shoes

But for real, I have a purpose for this blog.  That purpose is foot apparel.  Now, I know what you’re thinking….”foot apparel?  Nobody says that anymore Ben.  Use normal lingidy or I’m out of here.”  So fine, lets say “shoes”.  I have shoes.  If you’re reading this, you probably have some nice kicks too, don’t you?  You know who doesn’t have a nice pair of sneakers?  My girls in Honduras.  See, here’s my dilemma.  I’m poor.  Yet, even poor people can buy birthday presents for little girls in Honduras.  100 Limpira (or the equivalent of 5 dollars) goes a long ways in Honduras.  I messed up once and bought one of my girls a pair of Nikes.  Not a very expensive pair, but a $25 pair of tennis shoes.  She loves them.  So do all the girls at the farm.  Now, poor, broke Ben doesn’t have money to buy all my girls a pair of decent shoes (something that won’t fall apart after one month).  But, I know a lot of folks who aren’t so broke.  You know, people who own houses and cars and support their families and all that stuff I don’t have money for.  You know, people like YOU!

Here is my plan.  My church is going to Honduras the last two weeks of July.  You can take 2 bags weighing up to 50 lbs on a delta international flight.  I pack for 3 months in one 50 lbs bag.  That means, everybody should have one extra, potentially empty bag full of space for things.  Maybe 30 bags in all.  Would anybody like to send any of my girls a decent pair of shoes for their birthday?  Nobody has to go crazy, but the stuff that I can afford to buy them will not last very long at all.  A $25 pair of nikes or converse or any brand shoe from here would be a killer (yet extremely practical) birthday present for one of my girls.  I’m not sure this is unreasonable.  It’s the stuff parents do for their kids here in America, right?  So think about it.  I’m going to leave a list of birthdays of all the girls, and more importantly shoe sizes for every single one of my girls.  Now if you decide that this sounds like a baller idea, let me know.  I’ll cross the girl off the list so we’ll know who is left.  I’ll let you know where you can send the shoes so they get put in bags that are going to Honduras.  I’ll even advise you to put a card and a picture of yourself in the box so that my girls can know who cared about them enough to get them an awesome birthday present that they’ll love almost as much as the people who sent them. 

Carina kicking up some dirt

If anybody wants to help my girls out with this, you can contact me on here, facebook, at Bheath09@gmail.com, or at 770-616-6673.  I’ll be in the states until July 18, so feel free to contact me.  The list starts with the upcoming birthdays first.  Children obviously grow, so we might have to plan for some of the birthdays months down the road and make sure these sizes will still be accurate then.

Carina-   *Covered         August 7 -            Shoe Size= girls 6

Neli-       *Covered         August 12-           Shoe Size= womens 6.5

Rosy-      *Covered        August 30-           Shoe Size= womens 6.5

Mary-     *Covered         September 10-    Shoe Size= childrens 3.5 – 4

Maria Elena  *Covered   September 25-     Shoe Size=  childrens 2

Roxana        *covered     September 27-      Shoe size= womens 6.5

Yensy     *Covered        October 27-         Shoe Size= childrens 3.5- 4

Cinthia     *Covered       November 12       Shoe Size= womens 8.5

Lucy        *Covered       December 24       Shoe Size= womens 6 (childrens 3.5-4)

Alicia       *Covered       December 31       Shoe Size= childrens 3.5-4

Brenda    *Covered       February 9            Shoe Size= womens 6.5

Sonia       *covered        February 27          Shoe Size= womens 8.5

Paola       *covered       March 12             Shoe Size= Childrens 2

Lizzy          *covered     March 15              Shoe Size= Womens 6.5

Stefania   *covered      March 26              Shoe Size= Womens 5

Ana         *Covered      March 31              Shoe Size= Womens 6.5

Katy        *Covered      April 10                 Shoe Size= childrens 3-4

Zelaya    *covered         april 18                 Shoe Size= childrens 2

Angela     *Covered      April 27                 Shoe Size= womens 6.5

Gabby     *Covered      April 27                 Shoe Size= womens 5

Gabby is way too focused to worry about propper foot wear

A Birthday Post

But Zion said, "The LORD has forsaken me, the LORD has forgotten me."  "Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne¿  Though she may forget, I will not forget you!  See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands, your walls are ever before me."    Isaiah 49 14_16

Today is Jenny's birthday.  Many of you have been praying for her for the last two months.  Please remember and continue.  Jenny and her sisters still need your prayers.

Urgent Prayer Need

Hello all.  I'm back in the states, but I need to make another update now.  I got a call from Haley today which held some really bad news.

Earlier today, the mother of three of the littliest girls came to visit.  I don't think I'm supposed to use names on here.  These girls have lived on the farm for around 2 years and come from an extremely bad background.  They were picked up from a hospital at which they had been abandoned.  The oldest one was taking care of the younger two at the age of 7.  Honduras isn't kind to 3 unprotected little girls.  Anyhow, today the mother managed to grab the girls and get on a bus before anybody could stop her. 

Please, please be in prayer for these girls.  The were living at the farm for a reason.  I'm not sure what I can share on here.  I've probably said more than I should.  Yet, my fear for these three little girls is that they'll end up back in the horrible conditions that they were in before. 





God answers prayers.  Please pray for my friends.








Adios for now

So we've made it to what will probably be my last blog update until February.  Sorry about no pictures in the last several blogs, I haven't had good enough connection to upload any.

First off, I want to thank everybody who has read these.  Its meant more than I can explain to know that folks are keeping up with me.  Before I left, I was really afraid of leaving everything I've ever known in America.  But its been amazing to know that people are still here with me in a way.  Your encouraging words and prayers have meant far more to me than you can possibly understand.

So, I'm here for about 9 more days, but I probably won't post again.  Any fun things that happen in my last days, I'll probably just tell you guys in person when I get home.  I've got more stories than I can keep up with.  I can't wait to sit and reflect and talk with everybody.  I'm too pumped about it for words.  But for the last 9 days, I'll probably be at the farm with the girls for a majority of the time.  I've already started to get sad about the thought of being away from them for 2 months.  But, somebody has to put pan on the mesa.

So thats December 1st that I'll be back.  I'm working for 2 months with my wonderful big brother.  Thanks for the job Sam and Mark.  You guys rock.  I'll be home December and January.  If any Sunday School classes want me to come talk or share, please let me know.  My number in the states is 770-616-6673.  I would absolutely love to come share with anybody and everybody about how God is working in Honduras, how wonderful these girls are, a plethra of stories about life here, or about the needs and ministry opportunities that are down at PTC.  I really think that some of the reason God has allowed somebody like me to be here is to tell people.  I don't want to tell people MY story specifically, but about these girls, this ministry, and my amazingly loving and compassionate God.  So feel free to contact me.

Jesus said in the gospels that loving Him might require us to leave our homes and families and not look back.  I'm feel incredibly blessed that he's allowing me to come back and see the people I love though. I look forward to seeing everybody very soon.

-Ben Heath